System and method for integrating electronic mail accounts

ABSTRACT

In accordance with the teachings described herein, systems and methods are provided for integrating a plurality of electronic mail (email) accounts. A plurality of email services may be used to send and receive electronic messages over a wide area network, one of the email services being a preferred email service and another of the email services being a secondary email service. An email integration service may be used that is coupled to the wide area network and that is independent of the plurality of email services. The email integration service may be operable to receive account information regarding the preferred email service and the secondary email service and use the account information to configure a means for forwarding electronic messages from the preferred email service to the secondary email service.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims priority from and is related to the followingprior application: “System and method of integrating email accounts,”U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/403,633, filed Aug. 16, 2002. Thisprior application, including the entire written description and drawingfigures, is hereby incorporated into the present application byreference.

FIELD

The technology described in this patent document relates generally tothe field of electronic mail systems. More particularly, the patentdocument describes a system and method for integrating electronic mailaccounts.

BACKGROUND

Electronic mail (email) systems typically include a plurality of emailservices, each of which may receive and store email messages for aplurality of users. When an email service stores email messages sent toa particular email user, that user is said to have an email account withthe service. Each email account has at least one associated emailaddress, which may be used to send email to that account.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a typical email system. The illustratedemail system includes a webmail service 102, an Internet ServiceProvider (ISP) email service 104, a mail transfer service 110 andpreferred email service 114 that communicate over a wide area network,such as the Internet 108. An email service 102, 104, 114 is typicallyused to receive and store email, and a mail transfer service 110 istypically used to send email.

The ISP email service 104 is an email service hosted by an InternetService Provider (ISP). An ISP email service 104 is typically accessedusing an email client 106. The webmail service 102 is an email servicethat is accessible via the World Wide Web (WWW). A webmail service 102allows a user to access email stored by the service using a web client,such as a web browser 100. In addition, if a single email user hasaccounts with multiple email services, then one such email service maybe the user's preferred email service 114. The preferred email service114 may thus be any type of email service, such as a webmail service oran ISP email service, and may be accessed with an email client 116. Forthe purposes of this patent document, all email services other than theuser's preferred email service 114 may be referred to as “secondaryemail services.”

The email client 116 may, for example, be a personal computer, a mobilecommunication device (see, e.g., FIG. 6), or some other type ofemail-enabled platform.

The mail transfer service 110 may, for example, be a server whichimplements the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP). An email sender112, such as a commercially available email program, may be used toaccess a mail transfer service 110 in order to send email.

In operation, when an email sender 112 requests the mail transferservice 110 to send an email message, the mail transfer service 110contacts a destination email service 102, 104, 114 via the Internet 108.In this example, the destination service may be the webmail service 102,the ISP email service 104, or the preferred email service 114. It shouldbe understood, however, that other email system topologies are possiblein addition to that illustrated in FIG. 1. For example, the emailservices 102, 104, 114 and the mail transfer service 110 shown in FIG. 1are separate and distinct services. In other embodiments, however, anemail service may be configured to implement a protocol, such as SMTP,so that it may also function as a mail transfer service.

When an email user has email accounts with multiple email services, itmay be inconvenient for the user to access all of the email sent to eachaccount. It may be especially inconvenient if one of the user's emailservices can be accessed from a type of email client 100, 106, 116 thatis not available to other services. For example, the user's preferredemail service 114 may be accessible by a wireless mobile communicationdevice (see, e.g., FIG. 6), while the user's secondary email service(s)are not accessible wirelessly. In addition, it may be confusing for aperson to send an email message to an email user who has multiple emailaccounts. The person wishing to send the email message may not know towhich of multiple email services is preferred by the email recipient

SUMMARY

In accordance with the teachings described herein, systems and methodsare provided for integrating a plurality of electronic mail (email)accounts. A plurality of email services may be used to send and receiveelectronic messages over a wide area network, one of the email servicesbeing a preferred email service and another of the email services beinga secondary email service. An email integration service may be used thatis coupled to the wide area network and that is independent of theplurality of email services. The email integration service may beoperable to receive account information regarding the preferred emailservice and the secondary email service and use the account informationto configure a means for forwarding electronic messages from thepreferred email service to the secondary email service.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a typical electronic mail system;

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing an example electronic mail forwardingsystem;

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing an example electronic mail pollingsystem;

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of an example electronic mail integrationservice;

FIG. 5 is a flow diagram illustrating an example method of integratingelectronic mail accounts; and

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of an example mobile communication device thatmay be used to send and receive electronic mail messages.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

With reference now to the remaining drawing figures, FIG. 2 is a blockdiagram of an example email forwarding system for automaticallyforwarding email to a preferred email service 210. In this system, aforwarding rule 208 is included for the ISP email service 206 thatinstructs the ISP email service 206 to redirect email to a preferredemail service 210.

In operation, when a mail transfer service 202 sends an email on behalfof an email sender 200 via the Internet 204 to the ISP email service206, the ISP email service 206 checks for a forwarding rule 208 for theemail recipient. If a forwarding rule 208 is located by the ISP emailservice 206, then the ISP email service 206 sends the email message viathe Internet 204 to the preferred email service 210, which is specifiedby an email address in the forwarding rule 208. Thus, the emailrecipient does not have to access the ISP email service 206 directly toreceive mail, but rather may receive all email through her preferredemail service 210.

Once the forwarding rule 208 has been established, email may preferablybe forwarded to the preferred email service 210 without any input fromthe email recipient. To set up the forwarding rule 208, the emailrecipient may supply information regarding her email accounts to anemail integration service 201. The email integration service 201 maythen contact the ISP email service 201 via the Internet 204 to establishthe forwarding rule 208. Further detail of the email integration service201 is provided below with reference to FIG. 4.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of an example email polling system forautomatically forwarding email to a preferred email service 310. Thissystem includes an email polling agent 308 that is configured toretrieve email messages from a list of email accounts, which may behosted by different email services 302. For example, the email pollingagent 308 may contact an email service 302 at regular intervals via theInternet 306, and retrieve email messages from listed email accounts. Inanother example, an email service 302 may be configured to transmit anew mail notification to the email polling agent 308 when a message isreceived for a listed email account, which triggers the email pollingagent 308 to retrieve the new email message from the email service 302.In order to interface with the email polling agent 308, email services302 listed on the email polling agent 308 preferably support a standardmethod of retrieving email messages via the Internet 306, such as thePost Office Protocol (POP), the Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP),or others.

In operation, when a mail transfer service 304 sends an email message onbehalf of an email sender 300 to a recipient email account on thewebmail service 302, the email message is transmitted via the Internet306, and received and stored by the webmail service 302 in the emailaccount. The next time that the polling agent 308 contacts the webmailservice 302 after the email message has been delivered (or responds to anew mail message from the webmail service 302), the polling agentretrieves the new message and forwards the email message to therecipient's preferred email service 310. Thus, the recipient need onlyuse a single email client 312 to access the preferred email service 310in order to retrieve messages sent to either the preferred email service310 or to the webmail service 302.

The frequency with which the email polling agent 308 contacts emailservices 302 may be decreased to minimize the amount of network trafficgenerated by the polling agent 308. Conversely, the frequency may alsobe increased to minimize the amount of time between when a message isdelivered to an email account that the polling agent 308 is polling andwhen the message is delivered to the preferred email service 310.

Once the email polling agent 308 has been established, it preferablyoperates without any input from the email recipient. To set up the emailpolling agent 308, the email recipient may supply information regardingher email accounts to the email integration server 302, whichestablishes and configures the email polling agent 308, as describedwith reference to FIG. 4.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of an example email integration service 201,307. The email integration service includes a network connector 400,which allows the service to communicate via a computer network, apersistent storage module 402, a user interface 404, and an emailintegration logic unit 406. The email integration service may, forexample, be implemented on a single multi-purpose computer, on a systemof multi-purpose computers each of which performs different or identicalfunctions, or on another suitable platform.

The user interface 404 allows users to interact with the emailintegration service. The user interface 404 may, for example, include aweb application that executes on a multi-purpose computer and that maybe accessed via the WWW, a server application that can be accessed witha specialized client program, or some other suitable interface. Inaddition, the user interface 404 may use the network connector 400 toreceive connection requests or other information from a computernetwork.

The persistent storage module 402 is a memory device for storing dataused to establish email forwarding rules and email polling agents, andincludes a forwarding service information store 408 and an email serviceinformation store 410. The persistent storage module 402 may, forexample, include a computer hard drive, a database management systemrunning on a plurality of computers, a server implementing theLightweight Directory Access Protocol, or some other data storage systemor device.

The forwarding service information store 408 may include a list of emailservices that will accept requests for the creation of forwarding rulesfrom the email integration service. For each email service listed, theforwarding service information store 408 may contain a list of emailaddress domain names that are associated with that service. Theforwarding service information store may also include informationrequired to connect to the listed email services in order to establishforwarding rules. The email address domain names and connectioninformation may, for example, be populated when the email integrationservice is configured.

The email service information store 410 may include a list of emailservices that may be accessed using an Internet email retrieval method,such as the Post Office Protocol (POP). For each email service listed,the email service information store 410 may contain a list of emailaddress domain names that are associated with that service, and a listof the names of email servers that may be accessed to retrieve emailfrom the email service. The email address domain names and email servernames may, for example, be populated when the email integration serviceis configured.

The email integration logic unit 406 is operable to control thecomponents of the email integration service. The email integration logicunit 406 may, for example, be a software module executing on one or moremulti-purpose computers, a processing device such as a microprocessor ora digital signal processor (DSP), or some other type of processingdevice or system.

In operation, the email integration service establishes email forwardingrules and email polling agents. To establish an email forwarding rule oremail polling agent, a user may provide account information to the emailintegration service using the user interface 404. The accountinformation provided to the email integration service may, for example,include an email address, a username and a password for the emailaccount that they wish to integrate. The email integration service maythen use the account information to contact the user's email serviceprovider to authenticate that the user is allowed to access a particularaccount. Once account information has been provided to the emailintegration service and the email account has been authenticated, theuser may request that the email integration service establish aforwarding rule or email polling agent for the email account.

To establish a forwarding rule, the email integration logic unit 406uses the account information to look up the domain name associated withthe email account in the forwarding service information store 408. Ifthe domain name exists in the forwarding service information store 408,then the email integration logic unit 406 retrieves the email servicename associated with the domain name and any associated connectioninformation. The email integration logic unit 406 may then use the emailservice name and connection information to contact the email serviceprovider and request that a forwarding rule be established.

The email integration logic unit 406 may request that an email servicecreate a forwarding rule by sending a message to the email service usingthe network connector 400. A message sent from the email integrationservice to an email service provider may, for example, be contained inan email message, in an XML document sent via Hypertext TransferProtocol (HTTP), or in some other suitable format. The message maycontain account information and may specify a preferred email address towhich the user would like to have his or her email forwarded. Theaccount information may be used to authenticate the email account, asdescribed above, before establishing the forwarding rule. The preferredemail address may be used by the email service provider to establish theforwarding rule. In addition, messages sent from the email integrationservice to an email service provider may preferably be encrypted toprotect any confidential information.

To establish an email polling agent, the email integration logic unit496 uses the account information to retrieve an email service name, anyassociated email server names, and any other contact information fromthe email service information store 410. The email integration logicunit 406 may then create or configure an email polling agent using oneof the email server names retrieved from the email service informationstore 410 and the account information that was provided by the user.

If a domain name for the email service does not exist in the emailservice information store 410, or if there are no email server namesassociated with the email service listed in the email serviceinformation store 410, then the email integration logic unit 406 mayaccess the user interface 404 to request that the user provide an emailserver name that can be used to access the email service to beintegrated. The email information logic unit 406 may then attempt tovalidate the provided email server name by connecting to it using thenetwork connector 400 and providing the username and password that hasbeen provided by the user. If the email server validates the usernameand password, then the email server name that the user provided may beconsidered to be valid for that user, and may be used to configure theemail polling agent.

When a user has provided an email server name that is successfullyvalidated, then the email server name may be considered for additioninto the email service information store 410, so that it can be used forfuture email users who wish to integrate the same email service as isassociated with the email server name that was validated. Before addingthe email server name, the email integration service may verify that theemail server name provided by the user is actually a valid email servername for the email service. This may be accomplished by the emailintegration service notifying an administrator of the email integrationservice, and informing the administrator that there is an email servername that is being considered for addition into the email serviceinformation store 410. This notification may, for example, be containedin an email message sent to the administrator. The administrator maythen indicate whether the email server name should be accepted orrejected. If acceptance is indicated by the administrator, then theemail integration logic unit 406 may add the email server name into theemail service information store 410. If the email service is alreadylisted in the email integration information store 410, however, then theemail server name is added to the list of email servers associated withthe email service. If the email service is not already listed, then theemail service, the email domain derived from the email address providedby the user, and the email server name may be added to the email serviceinformation store 410.

In addition, upon establishing an email forwarding rule or an emailpolling agent, the email integration service may establish a sent-fromaddress preference on the user's preferred email service. The sent-frompreference may specify an email address (i.e., a “FROM” address) thatappears as the address that an email has been sent from when the user issending an email message. For example, the user may establish asent-from address preference to enable email recipients to reply to theemail address associated with either the preferred email service orother integrated email accounts. The sent-from address may, for example,be selected from a list of email addresses that are associated with theemail services that have been integrated into the user's preferred emailservice. In another example, the sent-from address may be dynamicallyset by the preferred email service based on which email service was thesource of the message (e.g., for replies or forwards). The emailintegration logic unit 406 may then contact the user's preferred emailservice using the network connector 400 and set the sent-from preferenceto the email address that the user has specified.

FIG. 5 is a flow chart illustrating an example method of integratingemail accounts. At step 500 account information is retrieved from auser. The account information may include an email address, a usernameand a password for the account to be integrated. At step 502, theaccount information is examined to determine whether the email servicethat corresponds to the email address supports email forwarding. Ifemail forwarding is supported, then a forwarding rule is added at step506, and the sent-from address may be set at step 513, both of which aredescribed above.

If the email service does not support email forwarding, then the methodcontinues at step 508. At step 508, the email service information store410 is searched for the name of an email server that can be polled, asdescribed above. If an email server name is found, then an email pollingagent is added at step 512, and the sent-from address may be set at step513, both of which are described above. If an email server name is notfound, then the method continues at step 514.

At step 514, the user is requested to enter the email server name usingthe user interface 404. Then, at step 516 the validity of the emailserver name is tested by establishing a connection and providing theusername and password when the email server requests authenticationinformation. If the username and password are not accepted, then themethod returns to step 514, and the user is asked to re-enter theaccount information. Otherwise, if the email server accepts the usernameand password, then the connection is valid, and an email polling agentmay be added at step 520 and the sent-from address may be set at step521, both of which are described above.

At step 522, the email integration logic unit 406 notifies anadministrator for the email integration service that a new email servername is being considered for addition into the email service informationstore 410. The administrator may then indicate whether the new emailserver name should be accepted. If the administrator approves the emailserver name, then the method continues at step 526, and the email servername is added to the email service information store 410, as describedabove. If the administrator rejects the email server name, then themethod ends at step 528.

It should be understood that the example method illustrated in FIG. 5assumes that if email forwarding is available, then the user will wantto have email forwarding set-up. In other embodiments, however, themethod may also provide the user the option of selecting email polling,even when email forwarding is available.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of an example mobile communication device 610.The mobile communication device 610 may, for example, be used as anemail client 106, 116 for one or more email services, as describedabove.

The mobile communication device 610 includes a transceiver 611, amicroprocessor 638, a display 622, a Flash memory 624, a RAM memory 626,auxiliary input/output (I/O) devices 628, a serial port 630, a keyboard632, a speaker 634, a microphone 636, a short-range wirelesscommunications sub-system 640, and may also include other devicesub-systems 642. The transceiver 611 preferably includes transmit andreceive antennas 616, 618, a receiver 612, a transmitter 614, one ormore local oscillators 613, and a digital signal processor 620. Withinthe Flash memory 624, the device 610 preferably includes a plurality ofsoftware modules 624A-624N that can be executed by the microprocessor638 (and/or the DSP 620), including a voice communication module 624A, adata communication module 624B, and a plurality of other operationalmodules 624N for carrying out a plurality of other functions.

The mobile communication device 610 is preferably a two-waycommunication device having voice and data communication capabilities.The device 610 may, for example, communicate over a voice network, suchas an analog or digital cellular network, and may also communicate overa data network. The voice and data networks are depicted in FIG. 6 bythe communication tower 619. These voice and data networks may beseparate communication networks using separate infrastructure, such asbase stations, network controllers, etc., or may be integrated into asingle wireless network.

The communication subsystem 611 is used to communicate with the voiceand data network 619, and includes the receiver 612, the transmitter614, the one or more local oscillators 613 and may also include the DSP620. The DSP 620 is used to send and receive signals to and from thetransmitter 614 and receiver 612, and is also utilized to receivecontrol information from the transmitter 614 and to provide controlinformation to the receiver 612. If the voice and data communicationsoccur at a single frequency, or closely-spaced set of frequencies, thena single local oscillator 613 may be used in conjunction with thetransmitter 614 and receiver 612. Alternatively, if differentfrequencies are utilized for voice communications versus datacommunications, then a plurality of local oscillators 613 may be used togenerate a plurality of frequencies corresponding to the voice and datanetworks 619. Although two antennas 616, 618 are depicted in FIG. 6, themobile device 610 could be used with a single antenna structure.Information, which includes both voice and data information, iscommunicated to and from the communication module 611 via a link betweenthe DSP 620 and the microprocessor 638.

The specific design of the communication subsystem 611 is be dependentupon the communication network 619 in which the device is intended tooperate. For example, a device 610 intended to operate in a NorthAmerican market may include a communication subsystem 611 designed tooperate with the Mobitex™ or DataTAC™ mobile data communication networksand also designed to operated with any of a variety of voicecommunication networks, such as AMPS, TDMA, CDMA, PCS, etc., whereas adevice 610 intended for use in Europe may be configured to operate withthe General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) data communication network andthe GSM voice communication network. Other types of data and voicenetworks, both separate and integrated, may also be utilized with themobile device 610.

Depending upon the type of network 619 (or networks), the accessrequirements for the mobile communication device 610 may also vary. Forexample, in the Mobitex and DataTAC data networks, mobile devices areregistered on the network using a unique identification numberassociated with each device. In GPRS data networks, however, networkaccess is associated with a subscriber or user of a device 610. A GPRSdevice typically requires a subscriber identity module (“SIM”) tooperate the device 610 on a GPRS network. Local or non-networkcommunication functions (if any) may be operable without the SIM device,but the device 610 will be unable to carry out any functions involvingcommunications over the data network 619, other than any legallyrequired operations, such as 911 emergency calling.

After any required network registration or activation procedures havebeen completed, the mobile communication device 610 may send and receivecommunication signals, including both voice and data signals, over thenetwork 619 (or networks). Signals received by the antenna 616 from thecommunication network 619 are routed to the receiver 612, which providesfor signal amplification, frequency down conversion, filtering, channelselection, etc., and may also provide analog to digital conversion.Analog to digital conversion of the received signal allows more complexcommunication functions, such as digital demodulation and decoding to beperformed using the DSP 620. In a similar manner, signals to betransmitted to the network 619 are processed, including for examplemodulation and encoding, by the DSP 620 and are then provided to thetransmitter 614 for digital to analog conversion, frequency upconversion, filtering, amplification and transmission to thecommunication network 619 (or networks) via the antenna 618. It shouldbe understood that although a single transceiver 611 is shown in FIG. 6for both voice and data communications, device 610 may include twodistinct transceivers—a first transceiver for transmitting and receivingvoice signals, and a second transceiver for transmitting and receivingdata signals.

In addition to processing the communication signals, the DSP 620 alsoprovides for receiver and transmitter control. For example, the gainlevels applied to communication signals in the receiver 612 andtransmitter 614 may be adaptively controlled through automatic gaincontrol algorithms implemented in the DSP 620. Other transceiver controlalgorithms could also be implemented in the DSP 620 in order to providemore sophisticated control of the transceiver 611.

The microprocessor 638 preferably manages and controls the overalloperation of the mobile communication device 610. Low-levelcommunication functions, including at least data and voicecommunications, are performed through the DSP 620 in the transceiver611. Other, high-level communication applications, such as a voicecommunication application 624A, and a data communication application624B may be stored in the Flash memory 624 for execution by themicroprocessor 638. For example, the voice communication module 624A mayprovide a high-level user interface operable to transmit and receivevoice calls between the dual-mode mobile device 610 and a plurality ofother voice devices via the network 619. Similarly, the datacommunication module 624B may provide a high-level user interfaceoperable for sending and receiving data, such as e-mail messages, files,organizer information, short text messages, etc., between the dual-modemobile device 610 and a plurality of other data devices via the network619. The microprocessor 638 may also interact with other devicesubsystems, such as the display 622, Flash memory 624, random accessmemory (RAM) 626, auxiliary input/output (I/O) subsystems 628, serialport 630, keyboard 632, speaker 634, microphone 636, a short-rangecommunications subsystem 640 and any other device subsystems, generallydesignated as 642.

Some of the subsystems shown in FIG. 6 perform communication-relatedfunctions, whereas other subsystems may provide “resident” or on-devicefunctions. Notably, some subsystems, such as keyboard 632 and display622 may be used for both communication-related functions, such asentering a text message for transmission over a data communicationnetwork, and device-resident functions such as a calculator or task listor other PDA type functions.

Operating system software used by the microprocessor 638 is preferablystored in a persistent store such as Flash memory 624. In addition tothe operation system, which controls all of the low-level functions ofthe device 610, the Flash memory 624 may include a plurality ofhigh-level software application programs, or modules, such as a voicecommunication module 624A, a data communication module 624B, anorganizer module, or any other type of software module 624N. The Flashmemory 624 also may include a file system for storing data. Thesemodules are executed by the microprocessor 638 and provide a high-levelinterface between a user of the device and the device. This interfacetypically includes a graphical component provided through the display622, and an input/output component provided through the auxiliary I/O628, keyboard 632, speaker 634, and microphone 636. The operatingsystem, specific device applications or modules, or parts thereof, maybe temporarily loaded into a volatile store, such as RAM 626 for fasteroperation. Moreover, received communication signals may also betemporarily stored to RAM 626, before permanently writing them to a filesystem located in the persistent store 624.

An exemplary application module 624N that may be loaded onto thedual-mode device 610 is a personal information manager (PIM) applicationproviding PDA functionality, such as calendar events, appointments, andtask items. This module 624N may also interact with the voicecommunication module 624A for managing phone calls, voice mails, etc.,and may also interact with the data communication module for managinge-mail communications and other data transmissions. Alternatively, allof the functionality of the voice communication module 624A and the datacommunication module 624B may be integrated into the PIM module.

The Flash memory 624 preferably provides a file system to facilitatestorage of PIM data items on the device. The PIM application preferablyincludes the ability to send and receive data items, either by itself,or in conjunction with the voice and data communication modules 624A,624B, via the wireless network 619. The PIM data items are preferablyseamlessly integrated, synchronized and updated, via the wirelessnetwork 619, with a corresponding set of data items stored or associatedwith a host computer system, thereby creating a mirrored system for dataitems associated with a particular user.

The mobile communication device 610 may also be manually synchronizedwith a host system by placing the device 610 in an interface cradle,which couples the serial port 630 of the mobile device 610 to the serialport of the host system. The serial port 630 may also be used to enablea user to set preferences through an external device or softwareapplication, or to download other application modules 624N forinstallation. This wired download path may be used to load an encryptionkey onto the device, which is a more secure method than exchangingencryption information via the wireless network 619.

Additional application modules 624N may be loaded onto the dual-modedevice 610 through the network 619, through an auxiliary I/O subsystem628, through the serial port 630, through the short-range communicationssubsystem 640, or through any other suitable subsystem 642, andinstalled by a user in the Flash memory 624 or RAM 626. Such flexibilityin application installation increases the functionality of the device610 and may provide enhanced on-device functions, communication-relatedfunctions, or both. For example, secure communication applications mayenable electronic commerce functions and other such financialtransactions to be performed using the device 610.

When the dual-mode device 610 is operating in a data communication mode,a received signal, such as a text message or a web page download, willbe processed by the transceiver 611 and provided to the microprocessor638, which will preferably further process the received signal foroutput to the display 622, or, alternatively, to an auxiliary I/O device628. A device user may also compose data items, such as email messages,using the keyboard 632, which is preferably a complete alphanumerickeyboard laid out in the QWERTY style, although other styles of completealphanumeric keyboards such as the known DVORAK style may also be used.User input to the device 610 is further enhanced with a plurality ofauxiliary I/O devices 628, which may include a thumbwheel input device,a touchpad, a variety of switches, a rocker input switch, etc. Thecomposed data items input by the user may then be transmitted over thecommunication network 619 via the transceiver 611.

When the dual-mode device 610 is operating in a voice communicationmode, the overall operation of the device 610 is substantially similarto the data mode, except that received signals are preferably be outputto the speaker 634 and voice signals for transmission are generated by amicrophone 636. Alternative voice or audio I/O subsystems, such as avoice message recording subsystem, may also be implemented on the device610. Although voice or audio signal output is preferably accomplishedprimarily through the speaker 634, the display 622 may also be used toprovide an indication of the identity of a calling party, the durationof a voice call, or other voice call related information. For example,the microprocessor 638, in conjunction with the voice communicationmodule and the operating system software, may detect the calleridentification information of an incoming voice call and display it onthe display 622.

A short-range communications subsystem 640 may also be included in themobile communication device 610. For example, the subsystem 640 mayinclude an infrared device and associated circuits and components, or aBluetooth™ short-range wireless communication module to provide forcommunication with similarly-enabled systems and devices.

This written description uses examples to disclose the invention,including the best mode, and also to enable a person skilled in the artto make and use the invention. The patentable scope of the invention mayinclude other examples that occur to those skilled in the art. Forexample, although the examples describe email messages as beingtransmitted via the Internet, another network may be used. The examplesalso describe the use of Post Office Protocol and Simple Mail TransferProtocol, however equivalent protocols may be used. Also, the examplesare provided with specific types of email services, such as ISP emailand webmail services, however any email service may be used in any ofthe examples. In addition, variations of the architecture of the emailpolling agent are possible. For example, a single email polling agentmay poll all accounts for all users, one email polling agent per emailuser may be used, or one email polling agent per email account may beused.

1. A system for integrating a plurality of active electronic mail(email) accounts, comprising: a preferred email service associated witha mobile device and operable to send and receive electronic messagesover a wide area network; a plurality of secondary email servicesoperable to send and receive electronic messages over the wide areanetwork; a user interface configured to receive account logininformation regarding an active email account; an email integrationservice coupled to the wide area network and independent of thepreferred and secondary email services, the email integration servicebeing configured to receive and store in a computer-readable mediumaccount login information regarding an active email account managed bythe preferred email service (primary account) and active email accountsmanaged by the secondary email services (secondary accounts), and theemail integration service being further configured to use the storedaccount login information to configure a polling agent; and the pollingagent configured to use the stored account login information tocommunicate periodically with the secondary email services to determineif electronic messages have been received by the secondary accountssince the polling agent last communicated with the secondary emailservices and, if so, to retrieve the received messages from thesecondary email services and forward the retrieved messages to theprimary account; wherein the account login information regarding each ofthe primary account and the secondary accounts includes a password;wherein electronic messages sent to the secondary accounts are forwardedto the primary account by the email integration service.
 2. The systemof claim 1, wherein one or more of the secondary email services is anInternet service provider (ISP) email service.
 3. The system of claim 1,wherein one or more of the secondary email services is a webmailservice.
 4. The system of claim 1, wherein the email integration serviceconfigures the secondary email services to transmit a new mailnotification to the polling agent.
 5. The system of claim 4, wherein thepolling agent retrieves an email message from one or more of thesecondary accounts in response to receiving the new mail notification.6. The system of claim 1, wherein a user may adjust an intervalcontrolling how frequently the polling agent communicates with thesecondary email services to retrieve electronic messages from thesecondary accounts and forward the retrieved messages to the primaryaccount.
 7. A system for integrating a plurality of active electronicmail (email) accounts, comprising: a preferred email service associatedwith a mobile device and operable to send and receive electronicmessages over a wide area network; a plurality of secondary emailservices operable to send and receive electronic messages over the widearea network; a user interface configured to receive account logininformation regarding an active email account; an email integrationservice coupled to the wide area network and independent of thepreferred and secondary email services, the email integration servicebeing configured to receive and store in a computer-readable mediumaccount login information regarding an active email account managed bythe preferred email service (primary account) and active email accountsmanaged by the secondary email services (secondary accounts), and theemail integration service being further configured to use the storedaccount login information to configure a forwarding rule; and theforwarding rule maintained by the secondary email services andconfigured to cause the secondary email services to automaticallyredirect electronic messages sent to the secondary accounts to theprimary account; wherein the account login information regarding each ofthe primary account and the secondary accounts includes a password;wherein electronic messages sent to the secondary accounts are forwardedto the primary account by the email integration service.
 8. The systemof claim 7, further comprising: a polling agent configured tocommunicate periodically with one or more of the secondary emailservices using the stored account login information to retrieveelectronic messages sent to the secondary accounts and to forward theretrieved electronic messages to the primary account; wherein the emailintegration service configures the polling agent if it is determinedthat one or more of the secondary email services do not support emailforwarding.
 9. The system of claim 8, wherein the email integrationservice automatically configures the polling agent if the secondaryemail services do not support email forwarding, without requiring anyaction by a user.
 10. A method of integrating a plurality of secondaryemail services that manage active email accounts and a preferred emailservice associated with a mobile device that manages an active emailaccount, the method being performed by an email integration service thatis independent of said preferred and secondary email services andcomprising: receiving account login information at the email integrationservice regarding the active email account managed by the preferredemail service (primary account) and the active email accounts managed bythe secondary email services (secondary accounts); storing the accountlogin information in a computer-readable medium; determining if thesecondary email services will accept forwarding rules; if the secondaryemail services will accept forwarding rules, then the email integrationservice using the stored account login information for the secondaryaccounts to establish forwarding rules maintained by the secondary emailservices, the forwarding rules being configured to cause the secondaryemail services to automatically redirect electronic messages sent to thesecondary accounts to the primary account; if one or more of thesecondary email services will not accept forwarding rules, thendetermining if a polling agent may retrieve electronic messages from theone or more secondary email services; if one or more of the secondaryemail services will not accept forwarding rules and electronic messagesmay be retrieved from the one or more secondary email services by thepolling agent, then the email integration service using the storedaccount login information for the secondary accounts to establish thepolling agent, the polling agent being configured to use the storedaccount login information to communicate periodically with the one ormore secondary email services to determine if electronic messages havebeen received by the secondary accounts since the polling agent lastcommunicated with the one or more secondary email services and, if so,to retrieve the received messages from the one or more secondary emailservices and forward the retrieved messages to the primary account; anddelivering messages forwarded to the primary account to the mobiledevice; wherein the polling agent is independent of the mobile device;wherein the account login information regarding each of the primaryaccount and the secondary accounts includes a password; whereinelectronic messages sent to the secondary accounts are forwarded to theprimary account by the email integration service.
 11. The method ofclaim 10, further comprising: contacting the secondary email servicesand authenticating the account login information.
 12. The method ofclaim 10, further comprising: establishing a sent-from email address tobe included as a sender address in email messages transmitted by thepreferred email service.
 13. The method of claim 12, wherein thesent-from address is selected by a user of the preferred email service.14. The method of claim 12, wherein if the email message beingtransmitted from the preferred email service relates to a previous emailmessage received by one of the secondary accounts and forwarded to theprimary account, then the sent-from address being dynamically set by thepreferred email service to correspond with the one of the secondaryaccounts.
 15. The system of claim 1, wherein forwarding of electronicmessages from the secondary accounts to the primary account permits auser associated with the primary account and the secondary accounts toreceive electronic messages sent to either the primary account or thesecondary accounts by accessing only the primary account.
 16. The systemof claim 8, wherein forwarding of electronic messages from the secondaryaccounts to the primary account permits a user associated with theprimary account and the secondary accounts to receive electronicmessages sent to either the primary account or the secondary accounts byaccessing only the primary account.
 17. The method of claim 10, whereinforwarding of electronic messages from the secondary accounts to theprimary account permits a user associated with the primary account andthe secondary accounts to receive electronic messages sent to either theprimary account or the secondary accounts by accessing only the primaryaccount.